Time for a test drive

I sat at the table in my new sparklingly clean and organised
studio and thought “where the hell is everything?” First of all, I
couldn’t find my design book or even a pencil, then as the ideas began to flow
for my new bathroom project, I had no idea where anything was. Ideas would pop
into my head prompted by the creative side of my brain, but then the practical side
of my brain would say, “where did I put that?” This happened over and
over again. Finally I came to terms with the loss of my wonderful collection of
stuff, I had to be the new minimalist me and only use what I kept. There was no
point in racing downstairs to the garage, rummaging through the boxes marked
for the garage sale looking for that piece of frou-frou that I knew I had. Had
being the operative word. I have to let go of the things that won’t fit into my
new studio, I have to be content in the knowledge that this precious collection
of frou-frou will go to good homes and be cherished as much as they were by me.

So I got down to the job of designing my new bathroom
project, three canvases with three small square canvases on each where the photographs
once sat. This gives me three sets of three, nine in total to do something
with; lots of options to choose, three of the same on each canvas, three of the
same but one of each on each canvas, nine completely different, or nine all the
same. Continuing with the water theme seemed important, some of the ideas I
came up with, fish stars coral, water patterns, sea creatures, shells, and
tropical themes. In the end I chose to do three canvases with three different
patterns and colours but all tied together with the water theme and the
techniques used. One canvas will have water patterns stitched over sand colours
and beaded with shells and glass beads, the next we’ll have water patterns
stitched over ocean colours and beaded with pearls and glass beads, the last
one would have fish silhouettes stitched over metallic colours and beaded with glass
beads.

That is of course as long as I can find my sewing machine!

Getting my house in order

Apparently Larry King is credited with this quote he was
talking about getting his house in order to reduce the confusion, a direct
reference to personal organisation. It dawned on me that that is exactly what I
needed to do, after I started cleaning my studio the cleaning frenzy took over
and before I knew it, I had cleaned out, sorted, organised, and rearranged
every square inch of our house. I sorted out our wardrobes (the salvos did
really well out of that), I cleaned out the kitchen cupboards, I went through
the linen press, the music room got a going over, we read wired the house with
cat five cable, and I reorganised all of our object d’art. Then I set my sights
on the office; the tax records got a going over, I upgraded software, I started
scanning old resources, I took an inventory of everything we own (including
photos), I bought Dragon Dictate (dictation software to help with my RSI
problems), there was nothing left untouched.

Once the turmoil subsided and looked out upon my vastly
improved, and clean house and office I felt I was ready to be creative again.
First project up will be the new artwork throughout the upstairs bathroom. When
we first renovated bathroom are created three pieces which featured photographs
I had taken of various seaweed from around our vast coastline. Unfortunately
the UV has got to them and faded them badly, so I have a plan to stitch my way
out of my block. And of course share my project through my blog.

My story needs triage

A reading by Sol Stein about revision was a timely inclusion into the semester. His idea of a “Triage” process for revision was both informative and reaffirming. He too likes to get the framework right before developing character and final editing. If the framework isn’t right, the story won’t be right and all of the wonderful prose or three dimensional characters in the world won’t save it.

He provides an excellent guide to developing character through a series of questions and guidelines for general editing. I was very impressed with his advice, so much so that I have created a template checklist to use when I revise my work. I particularly like his slash and burn approach to words.

His final piece of advice reiterates what I have said in a previous post; let it rest and relax. And that’s what I did. I left it until now to edit it. I hope I do him justice.

Overall this process gave me two things: confidence that I could do this and advice on how to achieve it. You’ll be pleased to know that I have no new grey hair.

Next project… Making more felt coral.

Fan Coral Felt on canvas 900mm x x1200mm

Captives and assumptions

Having gained such valuable feedback from the workshop I wanted more and knew of five people who couldn’t refuse or escape. Over the Easter break we went to our beach shack north of Perth and I knew our next door neighbour shackies would be there. It didn’t take too much threatening to get them to read my story. They are of various back grounds, education and ages and were perfect to see what responses the story would elicit from different readers. I knew that the characters needed depth but wasn’t really sure in which direction to take them. I got plenty of ideas from the five, it was fascinating to hear their different interpretations of whom the protagonists were and why they were. Most importantly it highlighted areas and issues that no one grasped and therefore needed more work. For example one friend asked me, “Why did they go to the Kimberley?” I knew but I hadn’t included or even hinted at it any where; one of the pitfalls when you work from your own experience – assumption, it causes omission of sometimes vital detail or opportunities for depth.

Armed with my notes and all of the suggestions, problems and ideas I went back to the computer and edited it again.

View from our shack

Rubber coated husband

During our holiday I bounced ideas of my husband, who over the years has developed a rubber coating impervious to dumb ideas. Regardless of what I throw at him he has the ability to filter out the rubbish and pinpoint the required. Saying things out loud to someone really helped, it was a bit like brain storming, one thing lead to another. We came up with a multitude of variations but none were quite right, although the bouncing did spark off a flurry of rewriting in the first ¾ of the piece. Rewriting the first ¾ had a similar effect, as I played with things the ending became evident. So I set to writing the ending with echoes in my mind from the bouncing: that sounded good, if I do this then I can write that, this should work. Yeah right. I knew how it should end but every time I wrote it – to me, it sounded really contrived. Luckily this coincided with my turn to present a piece for workshopping.

Reading your work aloud to a group of writers is a very daunting but beneficial experience. I learned that the ending was believable and received excellent feedback on the tension and emotions, where to highlight and were to dampen. I was encouraged. I had a complete story and first draft.

Boab Great Great Northern Highway between broome and Willare

Procrastination

Procrastination is the mortal enemy of deadlines and predictably it raised its ugly head for a week or so. As I was going on holidays over the Uni break I needed to get a complete first draft of the story finished so it could rest and relax. Like a beautifully cooked piece of steak I think any kind of writing should sit for a while before its first cut. I like to come back to it and ensure that it actually makes sense. Oh the plans we make. I diligently enforce a 10% a day writing quota that I obey with deference to the plan. It was going great guns until I got to the ending and… nothing. Absolutely nothing. I did all of things we discussed in the tutorials: I googled, I read, I scribbled on my diagrams, I what if-ed, I took a shower (all I got was wet) but I drew the line at vacuuming. I gave up and went on holiday.

Melaka River Old Melaka

Creative Processes

My proposal is due. I can think of at least 20 storylines – imagination has never been a problem – but none of them tick all the boxes. It has to be tellable within 6000 words, be interesting, have tension, three dimensional characters, mean something or say something. The “Write what you know” cliché pops into my head. Is that true? Only write what you know… that might be OK when I’m 94 and have accumulated a lifetime of experience but what about now. First epiphany, write what you know doesn’t restrict you to what you have directly experienced; it is drawing on what you have experienced to imagine what you might have experienced.

Next light globe moment was the “How to” from reading Kate Grenville’s memoir How I Wrote the Secret River in which she talks about the techniques she used to develop ideas from her experiences. Combined, these moments lead to me settling on a storyline; I would use my experience of travelling the Gibb River Road in the Kimberley and the people we met.

I open a word doc and very neatly type the heading and all the details a Uni assignment demands, and that was as far as I got. I had no idea where to start. Is this writer’s block? Am I already experiencing this much vaunted ailment of writers, on my first page of my first story? No. I am suffering from stupidity. I don’t know why I thought that my normal creative process wasn’t needed for writing when clearly it was. No matter what I am creating I start with a design, a framework of what I intend to do and I like them to be visual. I use software to create diagrams, flow charts and storyboards. From there the ideas and details are hung or suspended on the framework until they are in their correct position, just like arranging flowers or hanging a painting in your lounge. I started with a chronology based timeline of my trip and then played with people, places and events to suit. It highlighted many concerns and issues that had to be dealt with. For example, writing about Aboriginal people and their beliefs – not my culture and not my story. How do I write about them without sounding trite or clichéd? I hope I have achieved this.

Bells Gorge The Kimberley

Adventures in storyland

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Breakdown narrowly averted.  Well so far anyway, I haven’t submitted my story yet.  Preparing to edit my story again (I think this is number 10) I thought I’d better start the process review for my Creative Writing unit.  The unit’s main assignments have been a proposal for a story, a 6000 word short story – fiction that is, followed by a review of my adventures in story land.  Never having written a fictional piece before I was more than a little concerned with my indelibly etched historical bent, making things up is not what I do.  But that’s why I chose a Creative Writing minor in my degree, after a lifetime of writing in the business world, always concerned with informing or instructing, it will be nice to be loose with the “facts” and liberal with the “timeline.
So I hope you enjoy the posts over the next few weeks, as much as I enjoyed the writing process. I think I could get use to this new found writing liberalism – maybe a novel based in SecondLife.  Wouldn’t that be fabbo.

My lastest SecondLife persona:

Pirate Soosie - including Polly